We had neighbors over a few weeks ago to celebrate our second anniversary here. At first we did all the research we needed to do locally to find places future guests may want to go, including the local zoo.
Then we ventured into day trips on the weekend. There weren’t many. This is the West. Large open spaces. We’ve also been hoarding vacation days, taking two days last Labor Day to dip one toe into the water at the ginormous Yellowstone Park.
This time Jim took two days off and we drove to Boulder, CO to check it out. Nine hour drive in, ten hours out. Two full days there. We drove the plains of WY to get there, I-70 through Vail et al to get back.
En route we saw many pronged antelope, one in the road running and jumping like crazy. From the mind-numbingly boring trek through the WY plains we were still on the plain in Boulder. Once we got to the flatirons and up the mountains, though, it was incredible. We did a lot of driving because we only had two days.
During that time we saw the foothills, mountains, and drove peak to peak from Nederland to Lyons through a snowstorm.
This morning we took the mountain route back and only hit a little snow in patches. It was certainly not a boring route. Loveland is still open, we saw the lifts. Vail. well there was no-one there but it was still $15 for 31 minutes of parking and it wasn’t lunch time yet so I backed up and we went elsewhere less pretentious and costly for a closed ski resort.
We found the Boulder-ites either college-aged or super environmentalist and “I bike to work 30 miles each way, uphill” types. Housing is more expensive than even ski resort living with old housing stock and really awful kitchens and baths. Many families opt for communities several miles south with big, new homes that we called “Pleasantville.”
Our hotel actually had a $5 gift certificate (for hotel merchandise) or 500 hotel points NOT for saving the sheets or bath towels, but for completely dismissing any housekeeping for a day! That’s a first for me. The hotel is another story that I will tell the hotel.
We enjoyed the mountains, canyons, red rocks, but what really got us was the final 30 minutes toward our mountains, en route to our home. Dog is home too, still need to pick up Mr. Fish. Cheers, Dee
Cooking with Dee 